Roosali von Indien; Roosali von Rußland; Roosali von China; Und Roosali von Jappan im Skt. Adolf=Roosa=Gaarta 1922

This extraordinary drawing, by Adolf Wölfli, was made with graphite and colored pencil on paper. Wölfli was a patient at a psychiatric hospital in Switzerland. He made art using the most basic materials, and with painstaking intensity. Note how the colored pencils are densely applied, creating a rich, almost woven effect. It’s easy to imagine Wölfli hunched over his work for hours, building up these layers. The obsessive quality is key to its meaning. His process can be seen as an act of self-making, creating order from chaos. In its way, it shows us how artmaking can be redemptive, even under the most difficult of circumstances. Wölfli’s compulsive attention to detail transforms modest materials into a world of private meaning. It's a world where conventional distinctions between art and craft simply fall away.